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The Dyb House was built on Buholmen in Ålesund in 1879. It was put up by two families from Godøya. Arnt Ystenes with his wife Marta Ystenes, and Ole Kristian Dyb together with his wife Petrine Severine Larsdatter Dyb. The houses on Buholmen were not destroyed by the great fire in Ålesund in 1904. Therefore, is this house from Buholmen one of the oldest houses that remain from Ålesund. In 1978 the houses unfortunately were demolished in order to give way for the new highway to Ålesund. A lot of the houses in Ålesund looked like the Dyb-house before the town burned down in 1904. Houses like these were also commonly built along the coast of Sunnmøre from the 1840’s on Godøya, Giske, Valderøya, Vigra and the Haram islands. The houses were built with logs that were joined together in the corners. And they were wainscoted both on the outer walls and on many of the indoor walls. In the middle of the house lie a hallway and a kitchen with a living room and a bedchamber on either side. On the first floor lie a bedroom and a storeroom coming out on each side from the staircase. We know that the centre room upstairs was used as a shoemaker’s workshop by the families living in the house in 1910.
This shoemaker's workshop, "The stock exchange", was built by the cobbler Johan Danielsen Myren in Spjelkavik in 1920. Myren had done his apprenticeship with Petter Spjelkavik, known as "Petter Shoemaker", in 1917, and he ran his cobbler's shop from this little cottage for over 60 years. Locally the cottage was known as "The Stock Exchange", because it was here that people would meet to catch up on the latest news. During WW2 (1940-45), this was where people found out how the war was going, and where illegal publications changed hands. The cottage was moved to Sunnmøre Museum in 1982, and instead of being taken down and put back up again, it was transported whole on the back of a truck.
Borgund was a main trading and religious centre in the early Middle Ages. And it is mentioned many times in Saga literature. The town or market place grew from Viking times and was probably at its largest around the year 1300. At that time the place had a definate town like feeling. It was easy to arrive here by boat from all directions and goods that were to be transported further to Bergen were loaded up here. Craftsmen sold their wares here, and we can assume that that it was bustling both in the harbour and in the market place. Borgund was also known as a large Parish, consisting of four churches. All the churches were built in stone. This shows that the town was relatively prosperous. Pilgrims hiking towards Nidaros would quite likely have stopped here for a few days before they continued on their way. In modern times Borgund has become a key point on the Coastal Pilgrim Path. In the later Middle Ages, Borgund lost some of its status as a central trading place. The black death, a change in climate and a downturn in fishing could be some of the reasons for this. After 1570 there is no mention of the town in written sources. It was forgotten about and after some years the town of Borgund also disappeared from people’s memories. The first excavation here, was of Margareta Church in 1912, but excavations only speeded up after 1953 when the graveyard at Borgund church was expanded. Over the next 40 years there were several periods of excavations and all together over 45 000 objects have been discovered here.
"Larsnes wharf", also known as "Seljeset wharf", was a warehouse built at Haugen near Larsnes in Sande Municipality in 1888-89. At the end of the warehouse facing inland, there was a shop with a counter and a desk, and there were also two small rooms used as a storeroom and an office. Towards the sea, building had a winch for raising fish and goods up from the boats. This part of the warehouse was used for buying and salting fish. In 1866, the law was changed to allow free trade in rural areas. Any citizen without a criminal record could obtain a trading licence from the local police office, and start doing business wherever he wanted to. Nevertheless, high taxes were designed to prevent too many general stores from being opened i rural areas. In the days when the sea was the most important communication route, Larsnes was in an excellent location to be a steamship port and trading post. Until the WW1, alcoholic drinks were also traded here, and the building remained in use as a shop until 1941. After WWII, transport increasingly went by land, and Larsnes lost its importance as a trading post. The warehouse was erected at the museum in 1992.
In 1937, Karl Flydal built this smithy at Ytrebø farm in Østrem, Emblem, in order to supplement his income from the farm. Making scythes was an important part of his business, but the smithy also acted as a small workshop for repairing agricultural tools and machinery. There was a large forge, with an electrically-driven blower, an anvil, as well as a power hammer, lathe, drill press and emery wheel/sand equipment. Everything was belt-driven by an electric motor. The smithy was later extended in order to create space for a welding workshop. The building itself is new, but it was built in the same way as the original one.
The ruins that you are standing next to now are the remains of the Margereta Church, which was probably built around 1100 and was in use until the middle of the 1500s. It was during renovation work in the spring of 1912, that the tenants at Borgund vicarage came across the remains of an old wall. This was reported to the Society for the Preservation of Ancient Norwegian Monuments in Bergen. They sent the architet and archeologist Gerhard Fischer to Borgund. He examined the wall and it was establised that these were the remains of the Church wall. The excavation of the Church started in April of the same year. This was the first archeolgical excavation in Borgund and actually the first Medieval excavation in Norway. Fischer made precise drawings of what he had found. There were many graves around the church. Four people were also buried under the floor of the church. The Church was likely built by foreign stone masons. The walls were clad with marble. It is possible that this stone was from a marble seam on Humla, an island a little further into the fjord. Some of the marble from here was reused when St. Peter’s church was expanded in the 1630s. In recent times there have also been finds in and next to the church walls. Recently, during removal of grass and turf two dice made from bone have been discovered.
Almost all farmers in western Norway would take to the sea when spawners such as herring and cod neared the shore. Many of the would also go fishing between the main farm seasons in spring and autumn if they could get away from the farm work. Cod fishing was particularly important in Sunnmøre. Seven men would work on board the open-deck åttring boats. They left at dawn and returned to shore in the evening. During winter it was not possible to sleep overnight in open boats. Nor could the fjord dwellers return home from the fishing grounds every single night. They had to seek shelter somewhere along the coast. The fishermen found lodgings with people living on the islands or by building a "rorbu" hut. The islanders named these huts "fjordmannstover" after the men from the fjords who owned them. The "fjordmannstove" on display in the museum was known as "Ulvestadbrakka". It was built in Fosnavåg in 1868 by Lars E. Ulvestad and Rasmus R. Feden from Dalsfjord in Volda. The each captained an "åttring" boat and needed shelter for both crew and equipment. The house has two fireplaces - one in the basement for boiling cod liver oil and one in the west-facing kitchen. In the early years cooking would take place in the fireplace in the kitchen. A stove was later installed in the middle room which was used as a livingroom by the two crews. The dining table stood there, with a dividing line right down the middle. The room also had sleeping accommodation for the cook and for two crew members. The other twelve slept in the attic. The rooms at either end are of post and beam construction. They were used to store chest for food and tackle, tubs and fishing nets. The "fjordmannstove" and the open-deck boat were closely associated with each other. The era of these buildings came to an end with the arrival of decked boats with cabins and engines.
Many of the farms in Bjørkedalen had workshops like this for building boats, and this one came from the farm at "Pe-garden". Boats were built in many parts of Sunnmøre, but particularly where there was good access to pine trees, wich were used to make planks for the boats. In Bjørkedalen the forest was particuarly suitable. Here boat building provided an important side-income for the farmers, and in 1930 there were 23 farms in the area, all of which built boats. This workshop has a "grindverk" frame. This design was used for barns, boathouses, warehouses, boat workshops and turf houses - basically any building where good ventilation was required. The design is related to that of the longhouses from the Viking era and Iron age, the typical Norwegian stave churches and modern timber frame buildings. A beam was hung lengthways down the middle of the building, and it was used to hold the keel, stem and sternpost, and to keep the planks in position while the boat was being built. There are holes in the walls through which they could pass long boards and materials for the keel. The workshop was taken down in autumn 1965, and was erected at the museum in 1966. Some of the wall cladding has subsequently been replaced. The quality of the new boards is the same as the old boards, and the work was done using the original techniques.
The Church Booths These five “church booths” (“kyrkjebuder”) are all that remain of the 60 such buildings that once stood between the church and the boatsheds in Stranda. Such buildings have been around in many places all over Sunnmøre since the Middle Ages, for instance in Valldal. These buildings were used as storehouses for goods. If one were to ship goods northwards to Trondheim in spring, one would transport them to these houses in the course of the winter, either by boat or on horseback. If one had bought goods in town, one would also store them there, and then carry them home bit by bit. The “kyrkjebud” also came in handy whenever people went to church or to important meetings, because many would have to travel all day to get there. Thus, they would eat and change clothes in these houses and in between Sundays they would keep their best clothes and hymn books there. The houses are all constructed in almost exactly the same manner, with one room and a stable at the far end. Some have an attic above the bigger room. The furniture comprised a table, benches, pegs to hang clothes on and chests for storing clothes in. Primarily it was the farmers in the valley of “Strandadalen” who owned these houses, and they also had the right to let their horses graze by the farm “as far as the rope would stretch”. In the course of time, a small community with shops and a quay was formed around these houses. With the coming of the car, however, the “kyrkjebu” became superfluous, and had to give way to what is today the center of the small town of Stranda.
Borgund was a very important church site in the Middle Ages. At the most there were 4 churches here at the same time. All four were probably built in the 12th century. Remains of three of these have been found, whilst the last is only mentioned in written sources. Today, you can still see the ruins of the Margareta church, which lies on the headland down towards Klokkarsundet. This church was in use right up until the reformation. St. Peter’s Church, which was the parish church after the reformation, stood where today’s Borgund Church stands. You can find remains of St. Peter’s church in the walls of the transept that runs in the East-West direction. The two other churches, St. Matthew’s Church and Christ Church, are mentioned in Aslak Bolt’s land registery from the 1430s. They were referred to as disused Churches. The fact that there was a Christ Church in Borgund is very interesting. Christ Church was a name that was used for Bishops’ or Cathedral Churches. In an English overview of Norwegian Bishops from the second half of the 12th century, there was mention of a Bishop Tore from Borgund. So maybe there was for a short period a Bishop seated here?
In 1973 a law was introduced stipulating that "no person shall receive the sacrament of Confirmation unless he has first been schooled". Peripatetic schools were the most common, but children of the poor were often unable to access this form of education. Pastor Meldal in Borgund donated this building to the poor school "Borgund Fri- og Fattigskole" in 1743. Parts of the building are probably older, but in its current state the school building is in a style favoured by the professional classes in towns and villages in the period around 1750. These buildings always had the front door in the middle of the front elevation. The kitchen would be located behind the hallway. From the hallway, doors led to receiption rooms on either side. The school room was in the downstairs reception room on the right. On the first floor was a dormatory, and the teacher lived in the small downstairs room. The housekeeper lived upstairs. The school was run by a teacher and a housekeeper, and they were able to accept 12 children at a time. The pupils were given free board, accommodation, and tuition. There would be a new in-take of pupils every two or three months.
The Skodje House This dwelling-house was built as a three-room house in 1753. Later on a wood-shed was added to the house next to the entrance, together with an outside corridor along the back of the house. The doors leading out to these rooms can still be seen. The Skodje-house is a typical average farmhouse, a traditional type from the end of the middle-ages until about 1850. The fireplace is termed "røykomn". It is built of stone and clay, without a chimney. The smoke went out of the room through a hole in the roof, termed "ljoren". The fireplace was either placed in the corner next to the bedroom-wall, or in the opposite corner next to the entrancehall. The cooking was done in front of the stove over glows, raked out of the fire. The "røykomn" was in common use all over Western Norway because it required less wood-fuel than the fireplace with a chimney. In the excavated parts of the medieval town of Borgundkaupangen, near the museum, there has been found a fireplace similar to the "røykomn", dating back to about 1100 A.C. Skodjestova is furnished like the house of an average peasant family between 1750 and 1800. Nothing is painted. The only decoration is usually some woven textiles and simple woodcarvings.
Slettereitstova from Ramstaddalen in Sykkylven was originally the main farmhouse on the tenant farm Slettereit, owned by the Klokk farm in what is now the municipality of Sykkylven. The building was erected at Sunnmøre Museum in 1947. Bernt Pedersen Melset acquired the lease on the smallholding in 1836 and assumed ownership of it in 1840. The farm remained a modest homestead. The cottage was rebuilt in 1862, and a secondary livingroom, hallway, kitchen, large main room with an open hearth, bedchamber and attic room were added. The large livingroom was decorated using graining techniques once the open hearth was removed in 1865. We do not know who produced the exquisite paintwork, but it is thought to be either Ingebrigt Strømme or Jens Drabløs. The two painters from Sykkylven were in great demand. They would decorate the roof gables of many local homes with painted black rosaes on a white background. You will se an example of this in the house Lånastova in this exhibition. This particular decor does not feature in the Slettereitstova, where the walls in the main room are grained. The graining is completed with a border of stencilled geometrical figures. The crossbeam features red stencilling.
The Follestadstova cottage is a so-called "røykestue" ("smokehouse") with a log-built main room and a timber-framed hallway or porch. The present apperance of the cottage is an example of how a typical house may have looked in the 16th and 17th centuries. The cottage has been rebuilt and served a variety of uses over the years, and the high foundation and window have been added in more recent times. The cottage was first used as a dwelling, then as a workshop containing a workbench and lathe, a baking table, and a large slab on the hearth for drying cereal and malt for brewing beer. The room with the stone floor was used to store larger receptacles such as baking troughs and brewing vats. The passageway along the side of the house was used as a woodshed. We know that houses with one, two or three rooms were used as dwellings on farms and small-holdings a very long time ago. Single-room homes are thought to be the oldest type of dwelling. The kind of home a family would build depended on local building traditions, what their needs were, and what they could afford.
The viking ship Borgundknarren is a replica of a sailing vessel built in Western Norway in 1025. The knarr, or the hafship, was used for long distance trade by the Vikings and during the early middle ages and was the principal vessel for exploration. It is a heavy and capacious boat, with high sides and shelter necessary for deep sea sailing. It was ships like this Leiv Eriksson used in his voyage across the North Atlantic to America. Borgundknarren has its name from the old trading center of Borgund, now a part of the museum's outdoor area.